Letter: Scientist list partly fiction

I would respectfully suggest that anyone who read Denny Carlisle's recent letter on global warming should consider the source of his information and his conclusions with a huge grain of salt. In short, the "31,000-scientist" petition he cites and which has been around for a long time is false and misleading in a number of ways.

People who have investigated this story note that the list has many false names, that many who signed the petition in the first place have changed their minds, and, more important, most of those who signed are not actually active in climatological research, nor are they qualified in this area, nor are they necessarily even scientists.

Thirty-one thousand is a big impressive number to throw around even if all those who signed actually knew what they were talking about, until you stop and put the number into perspective. When you compare this to the number of well-qualified researchers from around the world who have determined repeatedly, over time, that global warming is not only real but human-related, you will realize what a painfully small fraction of the whole Carlisle's supposed number of scientists represent. Skepticalscience.com is a good resource for finding out more if you want to sort fact from fiction on this issue.